Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Holding Back
The Smell Factor
As I make personal choices about how to live my live by my values I am wary of the slippery slope I’m on. Whilst I aim to live my life in such a way as to empower the marginalised, promote equality and diversity, love others, protect and sustain the world and it’s peoples; the more hard core I get, the more I smell.
No offence to people like Ghandi, Jesus and Mother Theresa; their contribution to the world was monumental, but we all know that the very acts of changing the world for the better are often opposed to personal grooming.
Here’s an example of some thing that are good, but make you smell: Riding your bike instead of your car, avoiding aluminium deodorants, mulching manure, etc. I put together this sliding scale of ‘normal’ to ‘smelling’ people, I’m still pretty close to the ‘normal’ end, but am heading further down:
note: spelling in this may be ‘near-enough-is-good-enough’, also, the order of events may differ from individual experience.
Anyway, I’d rather smell and live in the world I hope for. You know, that is if I can’t have both. I’ll just take more eco-friendly showers. How far are you down the list?
A different kind of Christmas
It was posted by Christine Sine on her blog with a lot of other cool tips and resources on how to do Christmas differently. I highly recommend checking it out. Merry Christmas.
What to do…
I spent some time on this week’s comic. It’s supposed to be encouraging really. See, it’s about the ingenuity and achievement of people, who do amazing things, but are stumped when it comes to solving problems. We can use our creativity and smarts to solve the worlds issues, we just have to fight the fear and want it. i think that’s where faith comes in, at least for me, and where hope for something better is so important.
Overstated
I once worked for a power generation museum that educated school groups on how electricity was made and transported to our homes. One of the team working there was quite keen on educating students about the long term effects of burning fossil-fuels, and he used to regularly tell groups, “Every time you turn on a light switch, a little fish like Nemo DIES!” (Finding Nemo was a pretty big deal back then).
This was all good and well for a long time, until one day he said this to a group of students who were maybe a bit to young to cope with his poetic description of everyday pollution. A gasp went throughout the room, some tears were shed, they asked if they could turn off the lights in the museum and, needless to say, they were more than a little traumatised.
Exaggerating is fun, and enhancing stories with near-facts is a raw and creative poetic licence for our often routine lives. But in a world where so many causes compete for our attention (global warming, morality, human issues, marketing, relationships, Facebook) it seems that everything is blown out of proportion. My life is so larger than life, that it no longer all fits in: it’s bursting at the seems.
The world will end in 2012! If you eat your crusts your hair will turn curly! Your Ipad is ‘Magical’! Nine out of Ten Nutritionists recommend…! Certain unspeakable acts will make you go blind! If you litter a Kitten will get axed! All of these extreme messages, all of the time.
And do we believe it all? Or do we come to expect that things are less satisfactory than they present. After all, marketing must be based on convincing people that their experience of a product will be completely satisfying, life-alteringly so! And to convince you that those needs are actually met after you do purchase the product, they reduce your expectation of what a satisfying, life-altering experience is.
So here’s my thought, let’s start to talk about the world more accurately. Not the worst, not the best. Just is. And then let’s raise our expectations of what satisfactory is. We’ll strive for more and love even harder and ironically, I think we’ll be more satisfied. Thanks for reading, I love your comments!
Out of reach
One of my earliest memories is of trying to reach the door handle, and it being too high. I can remember frustration in that moment, of being unable to attain something so simple. Now days I often feel like I’m not quite there. Stretching for something only just out of my reach but entirely unattainable.
I guess I’m comforted by the fact that I can now reach door handles with ease. Also, there were always those around who could open doors for me. I’m not doing it on my own. I don’t really have the world on my shoulders. I’ll keep stretching till I reach the goal. Keep growing.
Persistent!
There’s something to be said about persistence, but Hazel will sometimes sacrifice all in search of the goal. I think that some things come with too high a price, and people are more important than our goals as well. Or at least my eyes think so.
Animal Magnetism - Strengths based failure…
This week I was thinking about the direction of my career and thinking about my strengths. Jess, my wife, was helping me and writing down the list. Some of my strengths, animal magnetism for example, made the list easily. As I recalled them, however, Jess suggested that a few of my strengths were not actually very helpful to my career. Like always being right. I’m very good at that; people think I’m right all the time even when I’m not. And even when people think I’m wrong, I’m usually sure I’m right. Being defensive was another, it’s like an art form for me, which helps in the ‘always being right’ department.
So then I thought not all of my talents are good ones. I don’t really want my greatest skills to be the ones that tare down my relationships. I could be the all powerful defence man! but I’m sure I’d be a super villain if I was. And I have plenty of strengths that could contribute to society, using my power for good instead of evil. I guess I just have to put as much energy into them as I do into being hard to live with and contributing to myself. Peace to all of you!
Waiting and Doubt
Sometimes waiting is hard, but not knowing what you're waiting for is harder. What if I'm wrong? What if it's not there? What if it's not what I think it is? What then? What now? You're waiting for something, or working toward something. I sincerely hope it's as good as you think.
Queuing...
One of the conversations I keep having lately is about whether our big goals actually line up with what we want. For example, someone might say that they want to be a police officer, but what they really want is to protect people. These aren't mutually exclusive, but they're not the same thing either. They get so caught up on the idea of becoming a cop that they don't even realize that this isn't what they really want, and when they end up behind a desk they're unsure why they feel unsatisfied. I think we should assess our goals and be aware of what they are and mean, why we want them, and how we'll know when we've achieved them.
There's plenty of goals placed on us by advertisers, social expectation, parents and peers, goals that we don't even really want; buy this, be the best, look sexy, impress your friends, get a good score, work harder, shut up, etc.
Are we on track to achieving real and meaningful goals? The goals we want?
Hazel Vs. the World
Hazel has a amazing ability to put things in her mouth. Whilst this seems to be a simple task, most people could not accomplish it with such skill as Hazel. her repertoire is extensive and includes, but is not limited to,:
Toys, cutlery, her feet, a pedestal fan, chair legs, bed sheets, the steering wheel on our car, guests, etc.
If you still think, that’s not that hard, then my challenge to you this week is to put all of the above items in your mouth. let me know if you succeed.
Hazel’s mission about the house seems to be to discover and explore. this got me thinking, that maybe that’s what we humans do. We constantly find new was to engage with the world around us. First we touch then taste, then crawl then walk, then talk and socialise, etc. Maybe that’s what drives us to the exploration extremes of space travel. I think I should find a new way to engage with my world this week. All of you with out pedestal fan’s in their mouths are free to join me.
Same Old Story
Why is it that I never seem to see the signs before it’s too late? And then I climb back out and brush myself off. It’s not that I want to avoid all the holes, it’s just how can I be falling into them again and again, same as last time.
I guess I’ll have to keep my eye closer on the path, these distractions are annoying. Also, I’ll build a barrier at the edge of the whole. maybe I’ll tell some friends where I ‘m going, and they can watch out for me. Or I could get busy doing something useful, a goal could keep me from wondering. I don’t want to see this hole again.
Pivotal Moment
I find that I say this to my self often, and then fail to free myself from my chains. I need a real change that will mean something real. Let’s hope this is it. This has to be it.
Waiting………….
Life isn’t a race, but why wait to get started. I’m often so scared that things won’t work out, but when I try things I’m always proud and excited. There’s still things I want to start, so maybe I should get them underway. If the right moment doesn’t come, I’ll have to do with the moment at hand.
What are you waiting for?
Distractions
These will pretty much take up my entire time…Still, sometimes it’s nice to be distracted.
But how do you tell the difference between your actual task and a distraction? I guess that’s why we have goals. A lot of people don’t really think about what their goals are, and so they never really achieve them even though they do all the things they think they’re supposed to do. If you don’t know where you’re going, you won’t know when you get there. Just a thought…
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